


Crushed Little Stars

by LadyVisenya



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Episode: s05e06 Required Reading, M/M, goes au from almost the start, takes place during
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-27
Updated: 2018-12-27
Packaged: 2019-09-28 20:21:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,987
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17189759
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyVisenya/pseuds/LadyVisenya
Summary: "Theo isn’t sure when lying about wanting to join the pack becomes true."season 5 au where theo chooses the pack and scott.





	Crushed Little Stars

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Escalus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Escalus/gifts).



> went with prompt #1. hope you like how it came out :) and happy holidays!

Theo already knows what he's supposed to say next as Scott tells him, trusts him with the newest development in his pack, soon to be his pack. This dumb caring boy with all the power at the tips of his hand, the line of his broad shoulders loosening as he confides in Theo. 

_ I came to find a pack not watch one fall apart.  _

It's not hard to figure out what to say. People are predictable. Yet Theo can't bring himself to utter those words as they walk across campus, sun shining like teenagers aren't being turned into-failures. 

He's been curious to find out how Scott will react when he loses everything. In those last moments, will he turn around and cling to life, not caring who he hurts in order to survive-in order to live, or will he accept his death, eyes heavy when he realizes the depth of his incompetence?

Stiles, his best friend, has warned him a thousand times over, and yet Scott's all too willing to trust Theo off the memories they'd had in fourth grade.

Scott has it coming. It's not his fault for not catching on, Theo thinks. He’s supposed to be the alpha. If he can’t protect his pack from Theo then he doesn’t deserve to be an alpha. He doesn’t deserve to have a pack.  

And Stiles, who's supposed to be the smart one, who is as smart and clever as Theo knew he would be, all the intelligence turned against him. The more he goes around insisting that Theo is lying, the more the pack grows to ignore him. That’s some fucking poetic shit if Theo ever knew it. 

Scott looks at him, waiting for his response. Lies spoken with just the right amount of care and sincerity to hurt. To dig into all the doubt that must be swirling in Scott's head as things spiral further out of control. The pack on the edge of collapse. It takes practice to lie as well as he can, his heart beat steady. It's all in the small micro expressions, a certain openness in the eyes. 

The hardest part was killing the urge to smirk when he lied, right after he said all the right things and knew he had them, when he knew he had what he wanted, self satisfaction running high. It had given him away as a child, too eager and no patience, they’d always known when he'd gone out no matter what he said or did. 

Later Theo had learned to be careful, that covering your tracks was just as important as knowing how to lie, cameras didn't lie after all. So he'd spent hours in front of the mirror, suppressing any ticks, any lingering smirk at the edges of his lips-

“They're your pack Scott,” he says instead, his lying tongue at a loss on how to comfort the other boy, how could he when the boy known as Theo Raeken is just claws and fangs dripping with blood, “your bond is stronger than this.” 

It's stupid and cheesy and does nothing to comfort Scott. 

But it doesn't hurt him. 

*

He isn't just the first chimera, he's also the only chimera that's lived this long he might as well be a success. 

*

Theo isn’t sure when lying about wanting to join the pack becomes true. They say the best lies are close to home and Theo’s never outright lied. It’s easier when dealing with supernatural creatures who can hear every beat of your heart, smell the stress when you should be sad. 

His partnership with the Dread Doctors has always been tenuous, that of need and sheer familiarity. His lack of say in anything hounding at his thoughts, bitterness flooding into his throat as he bit back his sharp tongue before they decided he was more use to them dead and dissected than alive. Theo thinks to himself, biding his time, it won’t always be like this, groveling in the dirt for a scrape of power. All he needs is a chance. 

_ Red alpha eyes and sharp claws.  _

But as  _ the Surgeon _ rebukes him, after all the trouble he’s gone through for them, all the errands and dead bodies, Theo realizes this is less a bone they’re throwing him than a simple distraction so he doesn’t get in the way. 

His claws sink into his palms and he takes a deep breath, not wanting to risk getting thrown against the wall again, he backs down. Theo has never lacked a healthy dose of self preservation and now is not the time to make a wrong move. 

He’s been playing both sides to his own advantage, but the time is coming for him to figure out what he wants, what will keep him alive before the same edge of the blade he’s been dancing on slits his throat the same way scalpels have cut through his muscles and tendons over and over again over the years until he didn’t even flinch from the bittersweet sting, scent of metallic tang heavy in the air. 

*

Theo’s hands are slick with sweat, dampening the pages as he reads. Everyone lapses into silence, even Stiles who can’t even sit still, fingers tapping against his knees in class. 

With everyone on edge, his own nervousness goes unnoticed, or maybe he's been playing his part that well. 

No, he thinks, if he’d played his part perfectly Stiles wouldn’t have suspected a thing. Everything was much simpler when he was following orders, acting within the margins of what the Dread Doctors set, even if their crackling clicks a poor substitution for a wolf’s howl, calling him to them, a mockery of what a werewolf really is. 

They made him into a perfect copy, but a copy nonetheless. 

His eyes skim over the same sentence once more and he has to force himself to turn the page every now and then. Theo’s supposed to be reading, but his eyes keep flickering to Scott’s broad shoulders, hand on his chin as he delves into his own copy of the book, jaw clenched. 

Kira winces, the kitsune in her unable to read, and Theo almost sighs in relief when Scott breaks the silence. 

“Anyone feeling anything yet?” Scott glances around everyone, his face lined with wariness after having spent all day reading but hopeful as he looks at his friends, at his pack. 

He looks at Theo the same way, like he’s already pack despite Stiles’ reluctance. 

It’s all Theo can do to keep from blurting everything out here and now, words tumbling out of his mouth like a man confessing on his deathbed.  Scott will never look a him the same way again, with trust and warmth and the casual way Scott would lean into him as the walked, when they sat next to each other on the couch, warmth spreading throughout Theo’s chest at the contact. 

His name would be said with the same resigned disdain as Peter Hale’s was spoken within the McCall pack. 

Theo was a boy hanging on by a thread and he wasn’t sure what more he could stand to lose. He’d once thought that there wasn’t anything more left, that he was as hollowed out as the taxidermied specimens freak shows had used to convince audiences of hybrid animals, or mermaids and other oddities. Funny how no matter what happened, Theo could always dig himself in deeper. 

There was  _ always  _ something left to lose. 

An untouched childhood, his life cut through before Tara and after Tara. 

He couldn’t lose Scott. He couldn’t lose his nerve or he would lose Scott. 

_ Scott was never his to lose.  _

“Tired,” Kira muttered. 

Lydia’s lips pursed up in complaint, “hungry.”

“Think he meant the book,” Theo easily says, keeping up appearances. He needs to find a way to corner Scott-to kill-to tell Scott everything. 

Scott who took him in without any doubt, stupid, and became an alpha out of the sheer force of his will and righteousness like something out of a fairytale, when the ugly frog turns out to have been a prince all along. 

He wants to believe that Scott will forgive him, will still want Theo around after he-but Theo knows better. Trust, once broken, can’t be fixed. They’ll always think of him as a murderer, as a monster, even if he spends the rest of his life atoning for all the blood his hands have spilled. 

*

Theo doesn’t go sleep at the cozy house he’s made up for himself like the real boy that he pretends to be for the pack, for Scott. Instead, he drives to the edge of the preserve, the only teenager in Beacon Hills with nothing to fear from the latest thing to go bump in the night and runs, runs himself ragged, senses tightened at full shift and thoughts streamlined in alignment with his baser instincts. 

Maybe he could just stay like this forever. 

Forget Theo the boy, Theo the chimera, Theo who could be Scott McCall’s. . .friend. Forget Theo.

A werewolf is defined as a man who changes for periods of time into a wolf. Nothing was stopping him from taking that to its logical end and losing himself in the animal. It would be easy and no one would look for him. 

That wasn’t true. 

His body slumped to the ground, tongue hanging out of his mouth as he panted, the early morning sun painting the leaves red and orange with a fiery glow. The Pathologist would find him easily enough, and there would be nothing keeping the biologist from stuffing him into a jar like all the other specimens who didn’t cooperate ended up in. 

There was nothing he could do but hope that Scott really was as good as everyone said, that Theo was wrong about people. That they could be good to their core, that they couldn’t be broken. 

*

Cornering Scott when the whole pack is on high alert waiting for the shoe to drop after reading the book proves harder than it should. It’s annoying because they’re always making stupid mistakes, leaving Liam unchained even without an anchor, trusting Malia to keep her penchant for violence in check, relying on Lydia to the point of weakness with no alternative, and now that Theo needs them to mess up and let Scott out of their sights they’ve decided to take things seriously. 

Even teetering on the edge, Kira shadows Scott, the two friends looking out for each other. And Stiles is going wall eyed from keeping one eye on Malia and another of him, gaze burning into his back like Stiles is imagining stabbing him over and over again. 

He’d make a good Dread Doctor. Clever, curious, and toeing the line of sadism. He could be the psychiatrist or the chemist. 

Theo almost gives up, takes the cowards way out and figures he  _ tried _ . Half heartedly, but he tried, when for the first time in his pathetic excuse for a life opportunity appears. 

His senses keyed to Scott the way a compass always points true north, the panic and distress wash over him faint as they are from halfway across the school, already making his way to his car. Panic surges through his veins. 

The Dread Doctors. Instinctual fear and knowledge borne from experience. Theo runs. His legs carry him to Scott before he can even wonder where he’s going, what his  _ plan _ is. 

It’s not the Dread Doctors. 

His relief is short lived when he see’s Scott proper up against a desk, lips blue, wheezing as he chokes down air through his lungs, eyes unfocused. An asthma attack. 

They had bonded over their shitty respiratory system once. 

Theo has nothing to help Scott with, all his machinations and strength useless. 

“Scott,” he whispers, crouching down next to him and shielding the boy from the students crowded at the door, “Scott look at me.” His hand reaches for Scott’s cheekbone before he can help himself, tilting the boys gaze towards him, but he looks right past Theo. 

He must be relieving some memory he’d pushed down. 

“Scott,” he tries again, “please,” voice breaking as the veins on his hand turn black, taking the alpha’s pain. It’s the only thing Theo had never mastered despite numerous sessions with he pathologist. 

“I’ve got it,” Liam yells, bursting into the room, “I’ve got the inhaler.”

Still shaken and shocked, Theo silently moves out of the way, stepping back to give Liam room. After all Liam is Scott’s beta and Theo is just some the memory of a boy stitched together in hopes that he might-

He disappears into the crowd before Liam even realizes he was there. 

*

In the end it’s Scott who comes to him, “Can we talk?” he asks subdued after his asthma attack earlier, leading them both to the empty lacrosse locker rooms.

“Are you going to be okay,” Theo says, his concern genuine for once as he watches Scott run his fingers over the inhaler.  He’s not sure he could say no to Scott at this point. Which is a huge problem when Scott regularly risks his life, rushing in head first to help every person who so much as stubs a toe, and Theo is still working on not murdering the only person who might help him.

“Yeah,” Scott says, shoving the inhaler in pocket, “I think it was just a memory. A psychosomatic thing.” His voice wavers to much to be convincing. 

“Scott,” Theo says carefully, leaning against the lockers and studying the ground. 

“Yeah?”

He swallows, closing his eyes and savoring the last moments that Scott will look at him the same way he did when they were kids. “I-,” Theo falters, choking on the truth, glass lodged into his throat. 

“It’s okay,” Scott says softly, their gazes finally meeting when Theo decides to look up. “What’s up?”

“I know about the Dread Doctors.”

Scott snorts, his brows wrinkling with confusion. 

“No, I mean, Stiles was right about me. I mean, I’m-I’m not a good person Scott. I came here with them, to help them, to hurt-to kill you Scott,” Theo finally manages, confessions tumbling out of his mouth, hands shaking so hard he feels he might shatter into a million pieces. “I’ve been working against you this whole time, helping them. Hurting you and your pack. I set Donavon on Stiles, and I’ve been helping them get away with making more chimeras, more chimeras like me.”

Hurt washes over Scott’s features along with betrayal, the image ten times worse in reality then anything Theo could have conjured up in his head. Scott draws away from him, lips opened slightly as he takes it all in. 

“I’m not a werewolf,” Theo manages, “I’m a chimera, the first chimera. I’m not the Theo you knew. I haven’t been that kid for a long time Scott.” His voice breaks on Scott’s name. He shouldn’t even be allowed to say it after what he’s been doing, after what he’s done. “Scott I-I’ve been helping them for a long time. Since Tara-,” he can’t finish that thought. 

Theo has learned to live with the blood on his hands and the bodies buried in the dark of the night, but his sister’s slow and agonizing death is a wound that won’t heal, won’t even scar over despite the time that’s passed since he watched her call out to him, voice weaker with every moment that passed that night s long ago. 

The impending silence is heavy. 

Theo expected Scott to lash out, to want to hurt him the same way he’s been playing and hurting his pack, the same way he’s been sliding a knife in-between Scott’s ribs so he can take his power. He can take that, he could take any pain so long as Scott did something. 

But he just stares up at Theo, broken. 

“Scott,” he utters, aware of the tears burning in his eyes but he refuses to cry, “please say something. Please. Tell me to go to hell, anything, and I’ll do it.”

“Why?” Scott asks, brow heavy as he thinks, dragging his gaze away from Theo which is just so stupid after everything Theo just told him and - why did it have to be him!

“I-I-I don’t know.”

Scott rises and Theo swallows hard, ready to be hurt and rejected and sent crawling back to hide in some hole and hope that the Dread Doctors don’t find him, because if they do, he isn’t sure he’s strong enough to go against them. 

Not a second time.

It’s not like they would hurt him without provocation. 

“Theo,” Scott says, wrapping his arms around him, “It’s okay. It’s going to be okay. You don’t have to explain everything right now if you don’t want to. You’re alive and you’re here and that’s enough. Okay Theo, it’s enough that you’re here doing the right thing despite everything. I can’t imagine how scared you must be but you’re here now, telling me the truth Theo, when you know better than anyone what they can do,” his gaze soft and steady as he looks at Theo, anchoring him to the world. It’s the closest he’s felt to okay in a long time. “I won’t let them hurt you ever again.” 

Theo feels Scott’s warm breath against his neck and eases into the embrace, trembling. 

“I-I don’t know why-,”

“Shhh,” Scott mummers, one of his hands running through Theo’s hair, “You were just a kid. It’s okay. We can figure everything out later. You’re going to be okay. We’re all going to be okay. Because of you.”

And somehow this stupid boy who can’t put two and two together understands without Theo having to spell anything out for him. Scott’s more observant than anyone gives him credit for. 

It’s smart to downplay it, to get lost in Lydia’s genius and Stiles obsessive curiosity. 

Theo closes his eyes and stops shaking.   
  



End file.
